When Gerry Loughran misspelt the name of the British monarch it was Githuku Mungai who called him out. “Loughran referred to his former queen as ‘Elisabeth,’” he told me in an email on April 30, 2023. “I know you’re quite particular when it comes to names. The correct spelling is ‘Elizabeth.’”
Gerry, a former Nation editor, writes the Sunday Nation column, ‘Letter from London’. Githuku is an accountant who catches errors “as a hobby”. When Gerry repeated the misspelling, Githuku wrote directly to him. “Greetings Gerry. For the second week today, you’ve referred to the late monarch as ‘Elisabeth’ instead of ‘Elizabeth.’ Regards.”
Githuku is, or more correctly, was the high priest of error tracking. Almost daily he notified editors and writers of errors he had found in Taifa Leo, Nation and Business Daily. Last Saturday, he hang it up. He gave no reasons and I dared not ask. The significance of his quitting is underlined by the fact that it’s hard for writers to catch their own errors. It is readers who catch them and Githuku has been catching them on a grand scale since 2019. Detecting and correcting errors is critical because, over time, errors impact negatively on the credibility of a newspaper.
Here I’m reviewing only a few of the errors Githuku has reported, in order to show the nature of the corrections. On Feb. 21, 2023, he emailed columnist Collins Odote. “Greetings Dr Odote. That was a good article in the Business Daily . There was a line that went ‘it is clear that citizens were not fully appraised of the true state of affairs.’ I’m not sure if you probably meant ‘apprised.’ Appraise is to ‘assess the value or quality of.’ Apprise is ‘to inform or tell (someone).’”Dr Odote responded: “Thank you Githuku for always reading and bringing corrections to my attention. You are right on this.”
On Jan. 26, 2023, Githuku wrote to fellow accountant Karani Mutegi whose article, “If the citizens benefit from tax, they’ll pay ,” was published in the Daily Nation on the same day. “That was a good article. You wrote ‘feel the pitch’ twice. It should be ‘feel the pinch.” The offending sentence read: “President Ruto has to prove to Kenyans that taxes will be utilised effectively so that they don’t feel the pitch of paying.” In her column, “Give institutions the teeth to bite ” (Daily Nation, Feb. 13, 2023), Kaltum Guyo wrote that “the cabinet formation left a bitter test in the mouth of Kenyans.” It should be “bitter taste in the mouth,” Githuku countered.
In his column, “Rescue Mumias from sugar cartels ” (Daily Nation, Aug. 30, 2023), Jaindi Kisero wrote: “We are all now waiting with baited breath to find out whether the investigations by the DCI will reveal the details...” It should be “bated breath”, Githuku advised.
In his column, “With such unlikely terrorists, we need to be more vigilant ” (Nation.Africa, Jan. 17, 2019), Mutuma Mathiu wrote “… they intended to sell their expensive household”. It ought to be “household goods”, Githuku said, “Maybe the editor noted that but feared to edit his Boss’s piece.” Henry Gikonde, Training and Standards Editor, responded saying it wasn’t quite so. “We’ve corrected this, Githuku. We appreciate your feedback.”
In his column “Is Kenya’s opposition hitting the self-destruct button ?” (Sunday Nation, Dec. 11, 2022), Prof Peter Kagwanja wrote: “As for now, Odinga should shun polarising confrontational strategies, appoint Azimio’s 22 shadow Cabinet Secretaries (CSs) to oversight Ruto’s ministries….” He insisted he was right to use the word “oversight” instead of “oversee”. Disagreeing, Githuku wrote to several editors and writers, including the Public Editor asking them to “arbitrate”.
On July 24, 2019, Githuku wrote to reporter Samwel Owino: “I’ve read your article, ‘Parliament backs new bid to nationalise Kenya Airways ’ (Nation.Africa, July 23, 2019). You said the government will be forced to pay KQ’s debtors…. Debtors are supposed to pay you and you’re supposed to pay your creditors. So, debtors are your assets whereas creditors are your liabilities. So, the government will be forced to pay KQ’s creditors.”
And so the Githuku error-tracking merry-go-round goes on endlessly. But he was not charging at windmills. Many of the errors he pointed out were corrected. He has hang up his boots rather prematurely.
The Public Editor is an independent news ombudsman who handles readers’ complaints on editorial matters including accuracy and journalistic standards. Email: [email protected] . Call or text 0721989264
